


Beastly Briar Rose

by clavash



Category: Original Work, Sleeping Beauty (Fairy Tale)
Genre: Fairy Tale Elements, Fairy Tale Retellings, Fairy Tale Style, Mild Blood, Old Work, Old Writing, mild body horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-08
Updated: 2016-06-08
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:21:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,794
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27651962
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clavash/pseuds/clavash
Summary: A twisted take on Sleeping Beauty full of blood, monsters, and poorly written prophecy-- all brought to you by an itty-bitty-baby author.
Relationships: Original Female Character/Original Male Character





	Beastly Briar Rose

**Author's Note:**

> Hullo! Seeing as I am to graduate at the end of this school year (hopefully) I realized that my school-email will be thusly deleted. I have some work on there that I don't want to lose and this is one of them.
> 
> This was a seventh grade project where we were asked to write a kinda spoof(?) of a preexisting fairy-tale. I think the goal of the project was to learn how to incorporate typical fairy-tale elements (like groups of three and such.) Anyways, I chose "Sleeping Beauty" and mixed a few elements from "Beauty and the Beast" before just riffing on my own. Not all of the wordage is quite up to my current standard, but I wanted to preserve it like I originally wrote it, as I'm still quite proud of the project. I do hope someone else finds it at least mildly entertaining though!

Once upon a time a king and queen lived in grief for the Queen could not bear a child. The beautiful couple tried once, tried twice and tried once more. But each time they tried and prayed for a child, the queen grew weaker and lost hope. Their final, third try brought the Queen to her knees the next morning and blood spilt from her every orifice. The horrified King lifted his wife and rushed her to his auburn steed, racing her to a witch doctor outside of the kingdom’s walls.  
The witch doctor did his best to heal the Queen’s ailment, but found the dark traces of a curse upon her womb. He informed the royalty before him of this curse and the newly-healed Queen ran from the thatch-roofed hut. Deep in the black woods, she fell to her knees and sobbed.

 _Oh why must this curse on me lay?_  
_It’s unbreakable, or so the doctor says,_  
_Perhaps it isn’t, perhaps it can be cracked,_  
_Could anyone help me with the fertility I lack?_  
And from deeper in the woods, a deep, gravelly voice responded.  
_Dear Queen, why do you cry?_  
_The spirits can hear you from where they lie._  
_A curse, you say? Oh dearie be,_  
_Would you be considerate to allow help from me?_ And the Queen, in desperation, took no heed of the way the voice emitted from a large dark shape with red and gold eyes. More fat tears tracked down her cheeks and she begged for the help of the Voice.  
A sparkling white grin, filled with too many razor-teeth grew on the Voice’s face when he heard her pleading cries, and he basked in the helplessness her aura glowed with. He slid from the woods, a great, smooth-skinned beast with many spines and a curling rictus upon his face. His crimson pupils were wide in happiness for the blood that pooled with the tears anew from the witch doctor’s failed healing.  
With great struggle, the Voice dimmed his grin and crushed down the pleasure that shone in his eyes. He soothed the Queen and hung a great foreleg on her shoulders, rubbing them with a massive clawed paw and taking care not to cut her.  
He whispered a few verses of the long-since dead language of his people and the Queen felt her illness heal entirely and a great feeling of elation filled her. The Voice had given her what she had wanted, healthiness, fertility and a child.

In 9 months time, she birthed her child. A kind, sweet and well beloved little girl with an appearance that made the knights in the kingdom draw their swords at first sight. The royal couple felt saddened that such a wonderful child would bear the weight of such judgment, but they were quite happy anyways. So happy, in fact, that they planned a great feast on the occasion of the girl’s 1-month birthday.  
13 women, the wisest in the land, came to the feast and chatted mirthfully over their meals. But eventually the time came for the women to see the daughter. Each felt inclined and had agreed earlier on to bless the child with riches and treasures the likes of which the castle did not possess.  
12 of the women gave her items such as these: a quilt sewn completely of gold with ruby embroidery, a glass of wine aged for over 500 years for when the girl was ready and a single thorn from a fast-growing bramble. But the 13th woman saw the child and was horrified, for she was the most magically adept and she saw the whisps of the beast that lay on the princess’ fangs and claws.  
_“You call this monster royalty?” she boomed, and the King moved to protect his child._  
_“FOLLY! I say! Folly!” And she pushed the King out of her way and spoke the young girl’s fate._  
_In 15 years from this ghastly day,_  
_The kingdom will feel this blessing I lay,_  
_The beast before me will fall into slumber,_  
_And the method to kill her will be far down under._  
And as she strode out the door, her traveling cloak sweeping, the King and Queen exchanged a confused and concerned look.

That night, the Queen sat up in bed and moved silently so as to not disturb her husband. She dressed herself in a peasant’s garb and stole away into the night. She mounted her own snowy horse and escaped from the kingdom walls.  
_On my daughter a horrid curse does sleep,_  
_And when it awakens her soul will be reaped,_  
_Oh beast, oh Voice, I plead of you,_  
_Might you take this spell away soon?_  
The Voice opened his eyes, which glimmered with irritation and he angrily seethed:  
_You think you can ask me a chore such as that?_  
_No, I cannot cure her, the curse will last,_  
_She will fall into slumber and suffer in silence,_  
_And her heart will be stopped by one of those tyrants._  
But then his voice softened and his eyes grew mirthful. A plan had sprung to his mind and he knew precisely what it was he would do.  
_However, dear Queen, I have a proposition,_  
_I cannot stop this curse but please do listen,_  
_I can enter the dungeon, where her threat resides,_  
_And I can protect her heart before she dies._  
The Queen nodded her head, desperate for her daughter’s safety and blind to the sinister twinkle in her helper’s eyes. Seeing her agreement, the Voice grinned and knew that in 15 years he would have a feast. And he could see his deception was effective and his actions seemed charitable.  
When the Queen returned home, she had the dungeons locked down and had prisoners kept in the horse’s stables. The king gave her an odd look, but said nothing. Perhaps his questions would be answered with time.

15 years later, the princess skipped through the streets and waved at the villagers she passed. By now they were used to her unearthly appearance, but many still hid their children behind themselves out of natural fear. Actions such as this caused the princess to frown, but she shrugged and continued her journey. Her mother wanted more thread to continue sewing a new dress for her fellow queen from another kingdom. Or so she said, the princess knew sewing was a nervous habit of her mother’s and the Queen had been acting abnormally nervous. Her father seemed concerned as well.  
The princess, Rosamond, entered the shop to her left and requested several spools of thread. Out of the corner of her eye she saw a woman spinning thread from a great mass of white wool. Rosamond approached her and asked to be shown the device, but, as she was examining it, her finger brushed the needle on top and she collapsed.  
Villagers screamed and panicked, fearful for the life of the kingdom’s princess. They carried her to the castle and hauled her into her bed in the topmost tower. And there she lay, blood seeping from her mouth and the small wound on the tip of her index finger. Some of the crimson liquid fell to the floorboards and, unbeknownst to her bedside visitors, fell through all the way to the dungeon, where a deep red rose grew quickly.  
The 13th wise woman, outside of the castle, had spent many a year thinking over her actions. Yes, the girl must die, but it has harmed her kingdom as well. And so, to save them from their grief, she put the whole kingdom to sleep.

Over many a year, the princess’ small bramble plant, that had once sat in a ceramic pot given to her on her 1st birthday, grew faster than ever. With the kingdom asleep, no one could trim it and no hateful emotions could impede its growth. The brambles grew and thickened, its thorns became as sharp as sabres and as hard as stone. It surrounded the castle walls and when men came, curious as to what had happened to their acquaintances, they were impaled on the large plant and their blood assisted its growth.  
100 years later, the Voice came and slunk through the thorns, his tough skin protecting him from injury. Along with him, on the opposite side of the kingdom, a foreign young man came. He was from across the sea and considered a peasant in every town he’d been to. But his brave decision to be the one to save the fabled princess was respected by those who believed in the lost kingdom and he was given armor as strong as diamonds and the sharpest sword that his helpers could find.  
He cut through the brambles and tediously climbed the deteriorating tower, finally reaching the top room. The princess lay on the bed, still in day-wear and with no indication of her age. The young man was horrified by the claws on her hands, crossed over her chest like an egyptian king, and the sharp teeth that sparkled in her partially-open mouth. But he was enraptured by her beauty. He ignored her pointed ears and many spines and lay a tender kiss on her lips.

Meanwhile, the Voice had entered the dungeon, and he grinned at the blood-grown rose that stood tall, large and full in a crack in the dungeon’s stone floor. He approached it and licked his lips, hearing the pumping of the princess’ heart in the delicate petals. His mouth closed around the flower and he ripped it from the floor, not noticing the thorns he swallowed with it in his bliss.

The young man gasped when the princess’ blood-stained lips paled.  
The beast coughed and gagged on the thorns.  
The man fell to his knees and sobbed his failure.  
The Voice collapsed, a trickle of blood from the corner of his mouth and dull eyes.  
The princess’ eyes opened and color returned to her face. She stared up at the man before her and smiled. The kingdom awoke around her and were thankful for the young man’s attempt to save them.  
The queen later approached the Voice, his dead eyes staring into oblivion, and she whispered her last words to him.  
_Thank you beast, you cursed thing,_  
_You are the reason my child’s voice can ring,_  
_And perhaps I should be enraged by your actions,_  
_But I was the one who gave you sanction._

A year later the two were married in the nearby church. The massive beast lay on the back pew and a beautiful rose grew from his bloodied chest, the princess’ steady heart pumping through the petals. And so the two, a young, foreign man and a cursed princess, lived a happy life to the end of their days.


End file.
